TaxTMI 
TaxTMI 
2023 (10) TMI 856
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....0-2023<br>Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 2668 of 2023 - -<br>GST<br>HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE K. VINOD CHANDRAN And HONOURABLE MR. JUSTICE RAJIV ROY For the Petitioners : Mr. Vinay Ranjan, Advocate For the Respondents : Mr. Vivek Prasad (GP-7) Ms. Supraya, AC to GP-7 Ms. Roona, AC to GP-7 Mr. Sanjay Kumar, AC to GP-7 Ms. Manisha Singh, AC to GP-7 For the UOI : Dr. K. N. Singh, ASG Mr. Anshuman Singh, Sr. SC, CGST & CX Mr. Shivaditya Dhari Sinha, Advocate JUDGMENT ( Per : HONOURABLE THE CHIEF JUSTICE ) The petitioner herein an assessee under the Bihar Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017 (for brevity 'BGST Act') is aggrieved with the notices issued by two different Tax Authorities, which has resulted in simultaneous proceedin....
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....o have limited jurisdiction in certain areas of the State and overall jurisdiction throughout the territory of the particular State. Hence, there could be instances where a Central and State Tax Authority has simultaneous jurisdiction over a particular area. The assessees are also assigned to either the Central or the State Tax Authority randomly, for administrative purposes, which assignment does not interdict either of the said Officers from initiating an inquiry against the particular assessee inter alia in intelligence based enforcement actions. 4. Section 6 of the Central and State GST enactments achieves the goal of harmonizing the cross enforcement of the Central Tax Officers and State Tax Officers. Section 6 of the CGST Act provi....
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....acted below:- "D.O.F. No. CBEC/ 20/43/01/2017-GST (Pt.) Dated 5th October, 2018 Dear Colleague, It has been brought to the notice of the Board that there is ambiguity regarding initiation of enforcement action by the Central tax officers in case of taxpayer assigned to the State tax authority and vice versa. 2. In this regard, GST Council in its 9th meeting held on 16-1-2017 had discussed and made recommendations regarding administrative division of taxpayers and concomitant issues. The recommendation in relation to cross-empowerment of both tax authorities for enforcement of intelligence based action is recorded at para 28 of Agenda note no. 3 in the minutes of the meeting which reads as follows....
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....has initiated intelligence based enforcement action, then the said Officer is entitled to complete the entire process of investigation, without any obligation to transfer it to the 'Proper Officer' authorized under the other enactment, even if the particular assessee is assigned, for administrative purposes, to the other Officer. 6. The assessee herein, had been issued with a notice dated 04.02.2022 for conducting audit by the Assistant Commissioner of State Tax, Gopalganj Circle, Gopalganj. The notice which is produced as Annexure-1 refers to the financial year 2017-18 and directed the production of accounts, records and documents for the purpose of carrying on the audit. The petitioner submits that he had produced the entire de....
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....n of the Division Bench of the High Court of Delhi in Indo International Tobacco Ltd. v. Vivek Prasad, (2022) 1 Centax 142 (Del). Therein, a similar issue arose of proceedings having been initiated by both Central and State Tax Authorities. However, since a common thread was found, the jurisdictional authorities themselves had transferred the investigation to the Directorate General of GST Intelligence to bring the investigation under one umbrella. It was found that the GST Act does not prohibit such transfer and in that context neither Section 6(2)(b) nor the circular dated 05.06.2018 has any application. 9. In the present case, there are, at present, proceedings initiated by the State Tax Authorities and the Central Tax Authorities and....